


(And Watched It) Begin Again

by Fandoms_are_my_lifestyle



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Fashion Designer!Asahi, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, Getting Together, I Don't Even Know, M/M, Mutual Pining, Pining, Police Officer Sawamura Daichi, Post-Chapter 386 (Haikyuu), Teacher Sugawara Koushi, Texting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-15
Updated: 2020-05-15
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:22:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24194269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fandoms_are_my_lifestyle/pseuds/Fandoms_are_my_lifestyle
Summary: Asahi almost tells him the day before he graduates.He almost tells him, almost pulls Noya to the side after volleyball practice to stand under the cherry blossom trees, almost gives away the third button from his jacket, almost tells him. The button had been ready, in fact, missing from his jacket but instead residing in the left pocket of his uniform pants, ready to be given. He'd been so close to doing it.But it wouldn't have been fair.So he doesn't tell him. He graduates, and there's a button missing on his coat but no one to claim it. Suga gives him a sad look from where he stands by Daichi but says nothing. They knew, of course they knew, but they weren't going to try and fight him. Not on their last day together.They stand together one last time, ending how they started - as teammates.And then it's over.And that's that.Except maybe... It isn't.
Relationships: (mentioned) - Relationship, Azumane Asahi/Nishinoya Yuu, Sawamura Daichi/Sugawara Koushi
Comments: 11
Kudos: 158





	(And Watched It) Begin Again

**Author's Note:**

> As always, for the one who got me into this fandom and doesn't seem willing to ever let me _leave it_ , the love of my life, [doodledevil;](https://www.instagram.com/doodledevil/) none of this would ever be as good without you.
> 
> Title is from the Taylor Swift song because I'm lame and suck at titles... Whoops.

Asahi almost tells him the day before he graduates.

He almost tells him, almost pulls Noya to the side after volleyball practice to stand under the cherry blossom trees, almost gives away the third button from his jacket, almost tells him. The button had been ready, in fact, missing from his jacket but instead residing in the left pocket of his uniform pants, ready to be given. He'd been so close to doing it.

But it wouldn't have been fair.

He was leaving, heading off to the Bunka Fashion College in Tokyo to pursue a dream he'd barely thought to be more than a dream, until he'd sent in his application and had been accepted, against all odds; he's leaving, far away, and Noya...

Noya would remain here.

Noya would remain here to lead Karasuno to victory once more, to watch over their kohai, and he would keep a piece of Asahi's heart with him. They'd been in a weird limbo since Noya's first year, since Asahi had quit the team, and he'd always liked the other boy, even more than liked, but it wouldn't be fair to Noya to confess and then leave.

Asahi wasn't that cruel.

So he doesn't tell him. He graduates, and there's a button missing on his coat but no one to claim it. Suga gives him a sad look from where he stands by Daichi but says nothing. They knew, of course they knew, but they weren't going to try and fight him. Not on their last day together.

(Asahi can't help but notice the discolored button on Suga's jacket that matches the color of Daichi's. It's no surprise. The two are practically married regardless.)

They stand together one last time, ending how they started - as teammates.

And then it's over.

And that's that.

* * *

The thing about Noya, though, is that he doesn't give up easily. Not on the court, not off the court, and certainly not when it comes to his friends.

Asahi's not surprised to get his first text. He's not even surprised by the second. What surprises him is that they just keep coming. Noya texts him in the morning, at night, sends him pictures of cute puppies and things that seem to remind him of Asahi. He even forces Asahi to download Snapchat so that he can send him more pictures. Asahi has exactly two friends on Snapchat: Noya and Suga. He still doesn't quite understand the point of the app, but seeing Noya on his screen makes his heart feel fuzzy, so he doesn't protest.

Noya's texts make his heart hurt. They make Asahi wish he'd never left Miyagi, make him wish he'd told Noya how he felt on that day before graduation, make him wish he'd kissed him beneath the Sakura branches. He hurts from deep within himself with the feeling that something is missing, something important. There's a hole in his heart where Noya used to be, and that hole burns like nothing Asahi has ever felt.

He thinks of Noya like he thinks of volleyball; longingly and lovingly, with the notion that even going back would never be enough, because it will never be the same. 

He sometimes thinks that that’s the worst feeling of it; the knowledge that he can never go back.

The knowledge that it would never be the same.

* * *

**Message Received: Noya**

>> ASAHIIIIIII!!!! 

>> LOOK AT THE DOG I SAW ON THE WAY TO SCHOOL TODAY 

>> [enclosed.image.png] _received_

>> HOW CUTE???

>> (/^▽^)/(/^▽^)/(/^▽^)/

Asahi looked down at his phone and smiled. He loved getting texts like this from Noya; little moments that he would see at the end of his classes that basically just told him Noya had been thinking of him. They made his day better. 

**Message Sent: Noya**

<< Very cute, Noya-San. 

**Message Received: Noya**

>> (ᗒᗩᗕ)՞(ᗒᗩᗕ)՞(ᗒᗩᗕ)՞

>> ASAHIIIIII

>> WHEN ARE YOU GOING TO STOP CALLING ME SAN?????

>> IT’S NOT COOOOOL 

Asahi blushed, focused on his phone as he navigated the hallways of his school, nervously skirting around people carrying big bags and portfolios. Life at college has been good, he won’t lie; he’s come a long way from the nervous wreck he was in high school, even if he’s only been here a few months. He’s made friends, spoken more both in and out of class, and he doesn’t get as flustered when trying to speak to others. 

He knows he owes much of that change to Noya. 

Asahi bites his cheek, contemplating his next move. What does he say back to Noya? He doesn’t want to sound too awkward, or flirty, or nervous, or-

His phone pings before he gets the chance. 

**Message Received: Noya**

>> ANYWAYS 

>> We have a practice tournament against Nekoma next month!! 

>> Will you come? I want to see you!

Asahi’s heart skips a beat at that, and he pushes down the butterflies in his stomach. Noya doesn’t mean it _like that_ , of course, but -

**Message Sent: Noya**

>> I’ll be there. 

**Message Received: Noya**

>> o((*^▽^*))o

He’s never been good at denying Noya anything, after all.

* * *

“I don’t know if I want to go to college, Asahi.”

Noya’s soft confession comes late at night; Asahi’s lying on his bed, shirtless, phone clutched to his ear as he doodles aimlessly on a piece of scrap paper. His hair is still wet from showering earlier, and his final project is tacked to a dress form behind him. It’s going to be an impressive-looking ballgown when he finishes it - _if_ he finishes it. It shouldn’t even be in his room, not really, and he must have been crazy to think bringing it back to his apartment had been a good idea. 

He shifts, trying to avoid his thoughts spiraling farther. He has to concentrate. 

“That’s not so bad,” he says finally. “Plenty of people take gap years, maybe you could-”

“No,” Noya cuts him off. He sounds unsure but unrepentant, so _Noya_ in tone that Asahi’s heart hurts. “I don’t want to take a gap year, Asahi. I don’t want to go to college _at all_.”

“Noya…” Asahi says gently. “Are you sure?”

“Yes!” The answer comes immediately, and then, “wait, no. I just- I just don’t know.”

Asahi waits, breathing into the silence as Noya pulls his thoughts together. 

“It’s just- like, okay,” Noya starts haltingly. “I don’t like school, you know that. And, like, I could totally just go pro for volleyball, I know I could, and don’t get me wrong I still love volleyball with everything in me, but I just-” 

He breathes out harshly, voice strained with emotion, and Asahi hurts for him. 

“I just want to do more, you know?” Noya says finally. “It’s a big world out there. I want to see it.” 

“Then do it,” Asahi says suddenly, and even he’s surprised to hear the amount of conviction in his voice, but... Why should he be? He’s in Tokyo because he decided to pursue _his_ dream; why wouldn’t he want Noya to do the same?

“Do it,” he says firmly. “Go and see the world.”

 _Come back to me when you’re done_ , he wants to say. _I’d wait for you forever._

Noya sighs into the phone, the line quiet between them.

The words burn Asahi’s throat, left unsaid, and when he hangs up, he begins to cry. He doesn’t even know why he’s crying, and yet -

It feels like he’s losing Noya. 

Noya was never his to hold. He burns fast and bright, and Asahi's known the whole time he would never have gotten close enough without getting burned. 

That knowledge doesn’t make the thought of losing him any easier.

* * *

Asahi begins to wean himself off of Noya, after that.

He answers Noya’s texts less. He calls less. He even accepts when Kawamura Kata, one of the most handsome boys in his Garment Creation class, asks Asahi to go with him to the cafe off campus. 

Kawamura is tall and lean, not quite as tall as Asahi but close, and he’s in the textile’s track for jewelry design. His fingers have little calluses on them from working with hot metal, and if Asahi closes his eyes, he can almost make himself believe they’re from sports. 

Kawamura is nice. His brown eyes are kind, and Asahi supposes he’s good looking - most of the other boys and girls in his classes certainly seem to think so. 

He likes Kawamura, he does. It’s just not the same. 

Asahi smiles and laughs over coffee and talks about small things - the new dress he’s thinking of designing for their next project, the new professor in the business track that everyone seems to think is attractive - but it feels empty. Kawamura would make a good friend, he thinks as they argue about color choices and talk about potentially working on a collaboration for a final project, but-

But. 

Asahi doesn’t feel anything. There are no butterflies in his stomach when Kawamura smiles, no sunshine warming his bones when their pinkies touch. Kawamura’s nice, and attractive, and yet Asahi feels- 

Nothing.

He goes back to his dorm after the date and sits at the small table in the communal kitchen, staring at his hands as he flips his phone over and over and over on the counter. 

He wants to feel something. He wants the butterflies that fly through his small intestine at the thought of Noya to fly for Kawamura, wants the sparks to fly between their fingers like they used to whenever Noya touched him. He wants-

He wants to talk to Noya. 

Asahi’s phone is in his hands and the number is on his screen before he can even think. His fingers are hovering above the call button when he stops to think. 

This won’t help him get over Noya. This won’t help him feel less broken.

He calls Suga instead.

* * *

**Message Received: Noya**

>> Asahi-San?

>> I haven’t heard from you in a while…

>> Is everything okay?

* * *

Asahi’s return to Miyagi after his first year in Tokyo is… Underwhelming, to say the least. 

Shinjuku is loud, big, and busy. There are buildings that touch the sky at every corner, and people are always rushing and shouting, and the lights from the billboards hurt Asahi’s eyes a little when he’s walking home late at night. Shinjuku is big, and in the heart of Tokyo, Asahi feels small. 

He likes the idea of being swallowed up by the city, of being just another small life in a sea of small lives, of wading this river of people every day without a single one of them knowing his name.

In Miyagi, everyone knows his name. Everyone stops to talk to him; friends, neighbors, his parent’s friends. Hamada-san from down the street corners him in the meat-aisle of the small corner market, talking about how much he’s grown and how good he looks and ‘ _you know my granddaughter, Rina, she-’_

Asahi never knows quite what to say when people corner him. He still gets nervous when people look at him for too long, still feels like he’ll shatter from nerves as he awkwardly blunders through answers to their questions. 

It’s not all bad, though. Suga and Daichi are home as well, still as disgustingly in love as they were in high school, and Asahi hadn’t realized how much he’d missed his best friends until he’d seen them again and nearly fallen into their arms crying. 

(Suga had laughed at him, Daichi had punched him, and they’d all pretended not to see the tears in each other’s eyes. It really had been too long.)

They spend all their free time together, relearning each other’s lives and talking about plans for the future. Suga tells Asahi all about the preschool he’s interning at and Daichi tells him about the harsh instructors at the Police Academy, wincing as he recalls punishments that make Asahi feel kinda nauseated. It’s easy and simple and for a second - just for a second - it’s like they never left.

It’s also the only time that Noya hasn’t been on his mind since he got home. 

It’s not even his fault, really; it’s just that Noya’s ghost haunts Asahi everywhere he turns, memories of the two of them together crowd every street and every store he passes, and he keeps turning to talk to Noya and Noya’s _not there_. 

Asahi debates calling Noya, over and over again. He considers texting him, apologizing for his silence, begging for Noya’s forgiveness. He even types out the text, a couple of times.

He never sends them. 

It’s been months, is the thing. He’d ignored Noya’s increasingly-frantic texts, convinced he was doing the right thing by keeping his distance, and eventually they’d stopped coming. He doesn’t even know where Noya is now - he could be anywhere from China to America, for all Asahi knows. 

Asahi’s tried to pretend that it doesn’t hurt, not hearing from Noya, but really, he’d done this to himself. He’d ruined it, because that’s what he did - he ruins everything unless someone’s there to stop him. Someone like Noya, for instance. 

Two weeks after he gets home, Asahi finds himself tracing the familiar path from his house back to Karasuno. He’s alone - he’d asked Suga and Daichi to come with him, but they’d claimed they were busy, although there was a weird tone to Suga’s voice when he’d said it that Asahi _really_ doesn’t want to read too far into. 

School is out for the season, so campus is empty when Asahi gets there, but his feet know the way to the gym even in the dimming light of the setting sun. He walks to the door, expecting it to be locked, but-

Someone’s already inside. 

Someone very familiar. Someone Asahi hasn’t been able to get out of his head - or his heart - for close to a year now. 

“Noya-san?”

The small figure before him freezes, and the ball he’d been bumping against the wall hits the ground with a quiet bang. 

“Asahi-san…” Nishinoya’s voice is quiet, and that’s Asahi’s first indication that something is very, very wrong. Noya is never quiet. 

Asahi stares at Noya, and his heart is racing so fast in his chest he’s scared it’ll break under the pressure. The silence between them stretches for miles.

“It’s good to see you, Noya-san,” he offers. 

“Oh, so now you’ll talk to me?” Noya spits, then turns his back to Asahi to chase down the ball he’d been using before. “Sorry, I’m not interested.” 

“I’m sorry?” 

“Yeah, of course you are. Haven’t heard from you in months, you know, don’t know if you died or starved or if you’re just _ignoring me_ because I, I don’t know, got too annoying or you moved on to better things while I stared at my phone in hopes that you’d just _text me-”_

“Noya.”

“And now I’ve graduated and I’m getting ready to leave and you just _come back_ like _‘it’s good to see you’_ and-”

“Noya.”

“Did you ever stop to consider anyone else, you know, like maybe the boy who thought he was your best friend deserved some sort of explanation for you fucking _ghosting him-”_

“Nishinoya!”

The sound of the other boy’s full name breaks through his rage and Noya slumps, seemingly suddenly exhausted, against the wall. 

“I just-” he starts, and Asahi’s heart _hurts_ at the tired sadness in his voice, the quiet vulnerability Noya used to share with Asahi that no one else ever got to see. “It’s just been a rough couple of weeks, okay, we lost to Nekoma in qualifiers and everyone keeps asking me about university and work and what I want to do with my life, and I don’t know, Asahi, I just-”

_I missed you._

“I needed my Ace to tell me everything would be okay. And you-”

It’s then that Asahi realizes Noya is crying. 

This is something Asahi knows about Noya: he wears his emotions on his sleeves, open and vulnerable if you know where to look. He is quick to cry and quicker to laugh; he is a dark storm when angry and a crackling flame when he is excited. He feels everything at one hundred percent, and he’s not afraid to show it.

It’s one of the first things that made Asahi trust Noya with his heart of glass. 

“Noya-” Asahi starts, and his voice breaks alongside his heart. “Noya, I am-” They’re both crying now. 

_“I am so sorry.”_

Asahi’s voice is a whisper, rough and forced from within the confines of his ribs, but he prys it from his throat and places his pleas at Noya’s feet, staring at the shorter boy with every emotion he’s ever felt for Noya written on his face. He hovers his hand against Noya’s cheek, unsure of when they’d gotten so close, but his hand is suddenly diverted as Noya sags against Asahi’s chest. 

“You were the one person who could make me believe everything would be alright,” Noya confesses, words muffled by Asahi’s chest. “I thought you’d left me again.”

_I thought you’d left me again._

Asahi’s heart drops out of his chest and shatters on the gym floor. For a moment he is two years younger, turning his back on his team and on Noya because he is scared. The irony of the situation doesn’t escape him; clearly, he hasn’t grown as much as he’d thought. 

Asahi was scared then. He’s been scared this whole time. 

He is tired of being scared. 

“I thought I was protecting myself,” he admits softly, burying the words in Noya’s soft hair. “I knew it would hurt me to lose you, and I thought it would be better for you if I just did you the favor of-” 

The words catch in his throat, but he swallows and tries again. 

“I was scared, Noya, but…” He lifts Noya’s chin, stares him straight in the eyes. “I’m not scared anymore. You make me invincible.”

Asahi stares at Noya’s face, searching for some sort of indication that he is forgiven even as he fears he will never be. He knows Noya, knows this boy’s inner thoughts and dreams, and he’d held Noya’s heart in his hands and broken it. He understands that now. 

Asahi doesn’t know why Noya would ever forgive him, but he looks anyway.

Noya’s eyes have always been beautiful, dark pools of emotion that show his every thought and feeling as clear as day. They’ve always been one of Asahi’s favorite parts of Noya; sometimes he thinks he’d be content to drown in Noya’s eyes if Noya would let him. Right now, Noya’s light brown eyes are tinged with red, skin still wet from crying. Asahi looks him in the eyes, and Noya looks right back. 

It’s almost like Noya is reading the words written on his soul. 

“I missed you,” Noya says finally. “Every minute of every day.”

“I missed you too,” Asahi replies, and he lets his eyes drop - just for a second - to Noya’s lips. 

Noya’s eyes widen, and Asahi can hear his breath catch. 

“Asahi,” Noya breathes, and there is something bright and deep in his eyes that Asahi recognizes but never had the guts to name. “Asahi, I’m going to kiss you now, okay?”

There is no air in the world anymore but Asahi nods anyways.

Kissing Noya feels like coming home.

* * *

“So what’s Nishinoya up to nowadays?” Daichi asks, settling back further into his seat on Asahi’s right. Suga elbows Asahi suggestively, boney elbows digging into Asahi’s ribs, and Asahi can’t help but blush. 

“He’s off fishing for Marlins off the coast of Italy,” he answers, clicking on his phone to show Daichi his new lockscreen. The fish is almost as big as Noya’s tiny body, but Noya looks so proud of himself, and Asahi feels his heart swell. Noya had sent him the picture two days ago, and it was Asahi’s new favorite thing - his boyfriend looked so confident, so strong, and Asahi fell a little more in love with him every time he saw it. 

“He wants to see everything the world has to offer, you know?” Asahi muses, staring down at his screen. Suga and Daichi are watching him, but it’s like they’re not even there; it’s just him, his thoughts, and a picture of the most beautiful man he’s ever seen. “He’s doing great things out there.” 

_He’s conquering the world, one step at a time… And when he’s done, he knows where I’ll be._

**Author's Note:**

> Okay seriously though why is literally everything I write just pining and fluff
> 
> Talk to me on tumblr: [fandoms-are-my-lifestyle](http://fandoms-are-my-lifestyle.tumblr.com/)


End file.
